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US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

macrumors.com

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Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#501

Post by lozenge »

microtonal wrote: post #380
andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

[flagged]

When a UK court made Apple merely put a notice on their website for two weeks (due to stealing Samsung's design elements) they similarly found the worst possible way to "comply". So much so that the court issued another order to do it properly.

The comments on the above Apple news website were all "why should Apple comply with a UK decision anyway".

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#502

Post by DeathArrow »

jve wrote: post #436
andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

Stealing? I see it as fee for an exchange to access to a huge market of wealthy people (one that can afford an iPhone probably can afford your app). Where entry barrier is extremely low. If you make 100 sales, you don't have to pay much, if you make huge profits off the platform you make huge payments to the platform owner.

>one that can afford an iPhone probably can afford your app

If I afford something doesn't mean I should buy. I grew up being poor and I earn my living working hard. Throwing money is not a good option for me.

Also, in what world affording a damn phone does make you rich?

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#503

Post by kelnos »

riscy wrote: post #354
infotainment wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP, but sticking with your store analogies, I would use the following: Apple represents the town government, and the App Store is the only general store in the entire town; other stores have been banned. Don't like it? You're free to pack up and move to another city! The reason I'd characterize it this way is that changing phone platforms is nontrivial. It's not as simple as just going to another store that day.

> The reason I'd characterize it this way is that changing phone platforms is nontrivial. I'm sorry, but how is it "nontrivial" to change phone platforms? Google says it's easy and all you need is a cable to get the best experience: https://www.android.com/switch-to-android/

Maybe it's "easy", but it's a lossy process. You lose all your purchased iOS apps, and have to manually buy the same apps (assuming they're available) on Android. If you watch the "See the steps" video, the fine print notes that Google can only "transfer" free apps that have direct equivalents (that is, released by the same developer) on the Play Store.

Your iMessage history disappears; Google can't transfer that to your Android phone. They claim to be able to transfer SMS/MMS history, which surprises me: I'm not sure how they accomplish that. I'm sure there's a ton of other user data that they also can't transfer. (Speaking of iMessage, any group chats you were in are now broken.)

Google of course has an interest in telling people that switching is easy and painless. It's not, though.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#504

Post by pritambarhate »

I think all developers should start charging 30% more (op top of the price for which it sells on website.) if user is purchasing via In App Purchases. Slowly all users will come to know that if you buy on web generally it's cheaper and they will change their behaviour and IAP sells will drop significantly.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#505

Post by psychoslave »

remus wrote: post #379
andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

I also think apple's 30% cut is excessive, but I don't think this line of argument helps. We should discuss the points on their merits, not based on who's making them and how much money they have.

If merit was a highly pondering factor of income, coal miners would be extremely rich and no annuitant would exist out there.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#506

Post by lijok »

DeathArrow wrote: post #475
charcircuit wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes This is how all businesses work. If there was no way to make profit then businesses would not exist. Apple spent billions of dollars creating an app platform with a clear monetization model that did not get in the way of them accumulating a lot of valuable apps and users. Developers are not forced to make apps for the platform nor…

>Apple spent billions of dollars creating an app platform with a clear monetization model I don't want their platform forced down my throat. On my PC I can download and install software from wherever I see fit. Had I not being a MacBook Pro user for the time being, I would have a chance to upgrade RAM and SSD without paying twice on the damn device. If anything, I consider Apple being an anti consumer company. What i…

Why did you buy a Mac then? You clearly knew the drawbacks, so I'm interested to hear, in this competitive market where both Windows and even Linux machines are now available, what made you decide to buy a Mac?

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#507

Post by DeathArrow »

Unfortunately we only have to pick between iOS and Android devices. Android devices are generally less expensive and maybe you have more freedom in some particular situations. Apple devices have better CPUs.

What I would like to see instead is more competition in the OS market and the hardware to be like PCs: you buy whatever device you like and install whatever software you want from wherever you want.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#508

Post by Aerbil313 »

ribit wrote: post #499
andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

I have difficulty following this argument, especially the "stealing" part. App Store does not just randomly take money from the devs. App Store also provides a service. They do world-wide payment and VAT processing, refund processing, discovery, distribution, user login management, APIs, distributed cloud storage, etc. It costs money to run these things. As a small-time developer, I think this is a great deal for 15%…

Well written. It can be argued that Apple also develops the OS and UI libraries which the apps run on/with, which is also providing something.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#509

Post by lijok »

andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

You need to learn the difference between defending an entity and defending an argument.

The line of thinking you're expressing here is what leads to questioning free speech and privacy absolutism.

Re: US developers can offer non-app store purchasing, Apple still collect commission

#510

Post by jdkoeck »

ribit wrote: post #499
andersa wrote: post #373

It's incredible that there are actually people in this thread arguing in favor of Apple. You don't need to defend the trillion dollar company. They are not your friend, they do not care about you, your work or your life. All they do is steal 30% from society that could be used for more productive purposes than make a few people who already have everything even richer.

I have difficulty following this argument, especially the "stealing" part. App Store does not just randomly take money from the devs. App Store also provides a service. They do world-wide payment and VAT processing, refund processing, discovery, distribution, user login management, APIs, distributed cloud storage, etc. It costs money to run these things. As a small-time developer, I think this is a great deal for 15%…

Again, it’s crazy people defend Apple on this. Apple is not just providing a payment platform, it’s forcing you to use it. As a developer, you should be free to use any payment platform you want in your app, like on the web. Let the user decide. End of story.
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